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I haven't played Earthdawn in an eternity, but I'm very high on the "everyone is magical stop whining about fighters being able to do things" aspect. I never played it enough to get a handle on its actual strengths and weaknesses in play.
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Aug 1, 2018 17:43
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Libluini posted:Recently I remembered I have the rulebook to Earthdawn 2nd Edition lying around somewhere. Out of nostalgia, I got the 3rd Edition a while back, and found it was much crunchier than I had remembered. It did fix a lot of bad stuff from the earlier editions*, but left other parts unchanged. Like, it still has nearly-useless Talents costing the same amount as the ones that, say, let you hit things. And your do-cool-stuff points are still your level-up points. It's been on my shelf since, largely ignored; I'd be more inclined to just run 1e again, warts and all. * Off the top of my head - d20's were removed from the Step table. d4's may have been, too - can't remember for sure. Karma got fixed to a d6, and most adepts could spend karma on at least one of their 'hitting stuff' rolls. I think Willforce was suitably neutered a bit.
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Aug 1, 2018 18:11
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 Mike Mearls, Supreme Leader of RPGs, has invented coin-flipping but sometimes it can zero out and, I guess, nothing happens?
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Aug 2, 2018 00:17
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That Old Tree posted:
Holy poo poo is he garbage.
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Aug 2, 2018 00:18
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That Old Tree posted:
I wonder what other RPG innovations Mike Mearls can adapt from Raven c.s McCracken?
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Aug 2, 2018 00:26
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That Old Tree posted:
But that's already a system! http://www2.hawaii.edu/~rdeese/RPG/D02/D02.htm
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Aug 2, 2018 00:39
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dwarf74 posted:There was a kickstarter a few years ago for a 4th Edition, and releases have been trickling out. They have not, to my knowledge, lit the world on fire. It is a very niche game compared to what it was in the late 90's. My group were hardcore Earthdawn players before the release of D&D 3e. I have 4e and it's... decent. There's nothing earth-shattering about the revisions they made to 3e, though apparently they did improve most things they touched. Very little controversy, though there are always earlier edition partisans. They've advanced the timeline to post Theran conflict, and Iopos is revealed as a villain in the setting. The form factor is annoying to me. It's the digest size, which I usually like, but not for a 300 page brick. The Travar book is underwhelming. While it's a reasonably detailed take on the city and there are things to do at all levels of power, it just didn't grab me, which is a shame as I'd been considering a pbp campaign of it. Older stuff is more or less usable, though there might be some rejiggering needed, so I may just did out my Parlainth set and do something with that. If folks have specific questions about 4e I'll happily provide what answers I can.
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Aug 2, 2018 01:10
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Just published my first nerd product under my own label: Banesquote:Every player knows that cold iron hurts fairies and zombies are weak to headshots. Weaknesses and vulnerabilities are classic parts of RPGs. But if you just use the most well-known weaknesses, the thrill of discovery is gone. Weakness becomes a matter of "Do I have fire? I use fire."
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Aug 2, 2018 01:20
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Lightning Lord posted:There's a lot to criticize about the Forgotten Realms but the lack of things for players to do is not one of them. FMguru posted:It's a big, sprawling fantasy world full of monsters and weird magic and ancient prophecies coming true and mysteries and warring nations. You kind of have to struggle to not find something to do. I'll absolutely cop to not being an expert on either, they're both deep settings with lots to explore. I speak only from my own experience, where I've found affecting the world as a player can be a struggle.
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Aug 2, 2018 01:35
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If your GM is a lorefucker, any detailed setting can be onerous to play in as you just wind up watching Signature NPCs do things or worse, run errands for them while being constantly shown up by them. Fortunately, even when I played with a DM who was a big Realms fan he was never like that. We never met Elminster, thank God.
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Aug 2, 2018 02:01
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When I run whatever glorantha system (probably heroquest) that won't be a problem because all my glorantha knowledge comes from kodp so all those NPCs have been dead for hundreds of years
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Aug 2, 2018 02:10
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My players didn't encounter any setting super NPCs in my Glorantha game until the climax where they were basically Hero War demigods and could do stuff with them on equal terms.
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Aug 2, 2018 02:14
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FR is a weird case, despite being a key prototypical packaged RPG setting, because of the sheer size of the franchise. For example, it has a bunch of novels that don't provide any grist for a good campaign, but that's not a problem. What is a problem is when that leaks into the actual game and large parts of sourcebooks are taken up with statting and discussing gods and epic-level NPCs. FR is one of few settings that has a separate sourcebook dedicated to its gods, and the others are indie intellectual ones like Tekumel and Glorantha. Faiths and Pantheons is interesting toilet reading but I can't imagine using any of the rules in a campaign. But it's absolutely built around PCs doing stuff in it, and places for them to explore--Waterdeep is a metropolis sized Town Outside The Dungeon. It's just most of that stuff matters little in the context of the metaplot.
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Aug 2, 2018 02:45
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So this is a thing. Richard Garfield teams up with FFG to create a deckbuildingless-yet-randomized card game where every deck you buy is randomly generated in some fashion and each deck has unique signifiers meaning you aren't allowed to change things around, what you buy is what you get for that particular deck. So far I'm extremely skeptical as to how they're going to pull this off in a workable fashion considering this is being billed as a competitive tournament game as well, and their plans for dealing with overpowered decks is to saddle them with handicaps or eventually retire them outright.
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Aug 2, 2018 02:47
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Oh cool, a game named "Keyforge: Call of the Archons" with an aesthetic that can best be described as "steampunk Overwatch." Nah.
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Aug 2, 2018 02:50
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cheetah7071 posted:When I run whatever glorantha system (probably heroquest) that won't be a problem because all my glorantha knowledge comes from kodp so all those NPCs have been dead for hundreds of years I think most of the big players you meet in KODP are still kicking. The only one I can think of that isn't around is Belintar the Pharaoh.
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Aug 2, 2018 02:57
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Wrestlepig posted:I think most of the big players you meet in KODP are still kicking. The only one I can think of that isn't around is Belintar the Pharaoh. Yeah it's more that Glorantha, even just the northern continent, is, ya know, a world. It's really big, and you can easily find areas without any super NPCs should you want to. KODP takes place in one small place of Orlanthi land, which itself only makes up like a quarter to a third of the northern continent.
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Aug 2, 2018 03:15
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Fantasy Flight posted:KeyForge: Call of the Archons is played over a series of turns where you, as the Archon leading your company, will use the creatures, technology, artifacts, and skills of a chosen House to reap precious Æmber, hold off your enemy’s forces, and forge enough keys to unlock the Crucible’s Vaults. Æmber. Æmber!!! BinaryDoubts fucked around with this message at 03:33 on Aug 2, 2018 |
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Aug 2, 2018 03:29
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A competitive card game with no deckbuilding or booster packs because you buy the whole deck at once and every single deck is unique and you can't modify them. What the gently caress?
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Aug 2, 2018 03:34
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On Keyforge - It's pretty crazy. If I read the article right, decks are all built from a big set of cards. So two decks could only have 1 card different and still be "unique"? If that's the case, I wonder how similar most of the decks will be, with only a small set of unique cards. Other than that, feels like "Sealed Deck: The Game". And Sealed Deck events are a once-in-a-while fun thing.
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Aug 2, 2018 03:44
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The cynic in me can't help but view this as an extension of the whole "games as a service" thing which has taken root in videogaming. Magic's randomization scheme is garbage but you can at least cobble together interesting formats out of cheap, low-cost cards like pauper's cubes. Keystone, by contrast, says that if for some reason you don't like the deck you paid $20 that you can either A). suck it up or B). spend another $20 and hope you get something more your speed. Or if you just get bored with what you've got even, it's still $20 a hit, you have no way of knowing what you'll pull, and you can't customize anything.
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Aug 2, 2018 03:50
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I...don't get it? Maybe I'm missing something, but how would anyone know if I switched out cards from one deck to another?
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Aug 2, 2018 04:19
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Vandar posted:I...don't get it? According to the description every deck has unique card backs, plus there's as-yet undetailed app integration which suggests there may be a way of digitally tracking the contents of each deck as well.
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Aug 2, 2018 04:25
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The Platonic ideal of Keyforge is probably a great game for highlighting player skill. The Platonic reality of Keyforge will likely be RNG: The Gamening, given that FFG have a less than stellar track record when it comes to balance.
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Aug 2, 2018 04:46
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Moriatti posted:What's the easiest way for me, a baby-brained buffoon, to start reading about Glorantha? I read that as highly-trained buffoon.
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Aug 2, 2018 04:51
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Ghost Leviathan posted:I read that as highly-trained buffoon.
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Aug 2, 2018 04:56
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Kai Tave posted:According to the description every deck has unique card backs, plus there's as-yet undetailed app integration which suggests there may be a way of digitally tracking the contents of each deck as well. Unique card backs won't help much if people are using sleeves. 
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Aug 2, 2018 04:58
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Vandar posted:Unique card backs won't help much if people are using sleeves. Magic's had tournament policies regarding the various restricted uses of card sleeves at different levels of competitive play for a while now, plus players and TOs are entitled to deck checks on top of that, so I highly doubt this is something that won't be addressed or hasn't been considered. As far as casual play goes there's nothing stopping you from doing whatever you want, but that's between you and your friends.
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Aug 2, 2018 05:07
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Card back examples:  Procedural generation for TCGs is kind of interesting and I'm fascinated by what this says about what printers can viably do now. on the other hand like gently caress i'm buying into this
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Aug 2, 2018 05:51
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Soccer ball, Splinter Cell, Thundercats, alien?
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Aug 2, 2018 05:57
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I dunno if my experience is atypical, but not of the FLGSs I've ever been to, spanning three major cities and one smaller one, have ever had a meaningful number of people playing any card game but Magic or Pokemon, or back some years, Yugioh.
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Aug 2, 2018 06:01
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Kai Tave posted:The cynic in me can't help but view this as an extension of the whole "games as a service" thing which has taken root in videogaming. Magic's randomization scheme is garbage but you can at least cobble together interesting formats out of cheap, low-cost cards like pauper's cubes. Keystone, by contrast, says that if for some reason you don't like the deck you paid $20 that you can either A). suck it up or B). spend another $20 and hope you get something more your speed. Or if you just get bored with what you've got even, it's still $20 a hit, you have no way of knowing what you'll pull, and you can't customize anything. I mean, this probably true as far as FFG is concerned, but it is well documented that when Richard Garfield designed MtG he wanted, and expected, it to be a game where people only bought a small number of cards. The idea being that every time you played someone new you would see some crazy card you hadn't seen before. It looks like he's never really given up on that idea. I'm not sure this will actually work at all, but it does look like an attempt to realise that design goal.
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Aug 2, 2018 06:08
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This sounds like something that would work better as a computer game, but who wants to to be stuck with whatever deck you pull versus whatever random deck someone else pulls?
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Aug 2, 2018 06:15
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fool_of_sound posted:I dunno if my experience is atypical, but not of the FLGSs I've ever been to, spanning three major cities and one smaller one, have ever had a meaningful number of people playing any card game but Magic or Pokemon, or back some years, Yugioh. I think it depends on the region. Android: Netrunner was apparently popular enough to have a tournament scene and while I doubt it came close to doing Magic or Pokemon numbers it isn't completely implausible that FFG makes a card game that's popular enough to merit ongoing competitive support given that they've already done so before. That said, I'm definitely not sold on this particular concept since I'm not really sure who it's designed to appeal to outside of the demographic that just really, really fuckin loves sealed deck tournaments and nothing else. A game where everything revolves around immutable preconstructed decks means that there's much less appeal for people who want to tinker and customize, and casual players who run into a deck that whoops their rear end solely by virtue of their opponent having better luck when they spent their money and the answer being "well buy more decks and hope you pull good!" doesn't seem like a winning strategy either. Apparently, going off of the rules, the solution to the "what do we do when two decks are clearly mismatched" dilemma is to put "chains" on the better deck which hamper its card draw out of the gate and I don't see this being a satisfactory solution for anybody who gets told "sorry, the thing you bought blind is too good so now you can't play it without a handicap." thefakenews posted:I mean, this probably true as far as FFG is concerned, but it is well documented that when Richard Garfield designed MtG he wanted, and expected, it to be a game where people only bought a small number of cards. The idea being that every time you played someone new you would see some crazy card you hadn't seen before. That still isn't gonna fuckin happen though. If this game is anything other than a complete flop it's going to be a matter of a couple of months at most before a comprehensive card database exists where anyone can look up everything there is to offer. Unless this game is somehow procedurally generating a shitzillion unique cards all the time the novelty factor is going to wear out quick, and then what you're left with is a CCG with no deckbuilding and nothing worth collecting.
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Aug 2, 2018 06:26
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Kai Tave posted:That still isn't gonna fuckin happen though. If this game is anything other than a complete flop it's going to be a matter of a couple of months at most before a comprehensive card database exists where anyone can look up everything there is to offer. Unless this game is somehow procedurally generating a shitzillion unique cards all the time the novelty factor is going to wear out quick, and then what you're left with is a CCG with no deckbuilding and nothing worth collecting. Hence my expressing scepticism about the design goal being realised, but I still think this is what Garfield is trying to do. It's not like it was ever gonna work for MtG either.
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Aug 2, 2018 06:34
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thefakenews posted:Hence my expressing scepticism about the design goal being realised, but I still think this is what Garfield is trying to do. It's not like it was ever gonna work for MtG either. I mean back when Magic very first launched you could plausibly entertain the idea that nobody was going to devote themselves to rigorously updating a meticulous database of every card in existence for anyone in the world to pore over but that was in 1993.
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Aug 2, 2018 06:36
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starkebn posted:This sounds like something that would work better as a computer game, but who wants to to be stuck with whatever deck you pull versus whatever random deck someone else pulls? Or a slay the the spire type roguelike with a more varied starter deck. I just want an up to date version of the 90s magic crpg OK? jadarx posted:On Keyforge - It's pretty crazy. If I read the article right, decks are all built from a big set of cards. So two decks could only have 1 card different and still be "unique"? If that's the case, I wonder how similar most of the decks will be, with only a small set of unique cards. quote:In fact, in just the first set of KeyForge, Call of the Archons, there are more than 104,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 possible decks!
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Aug 2, 2018 09:21
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This sounds really stupid and I'd honestly rather buy back into Magic or Pokemon than try this thing out.
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Aug 2, 2018 09:24
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I'm suddenly reminded of Metal Gear Ac!d of all things.
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Aug 2, 2018 09:54
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I honestly don't enjoy deckbuilding, and find netdecking kind of unsatisfying, so the idea of a card game that lacks those things sounds good. This isn't a great solution, since it just replaces netdecking with really expensive booster packs that you might get no use out of whatsoever, especially once there's sites that'll tell you if your deck is any good or not. Maybe if your brain isn't broken like mine you'll be able to try and eke out some fun from playing a lovely deck, but I personally wouldn't enjoy that experience.
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Aug 2, 2018 09:54
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